


Staying Power

by beetle



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M, Season/Series 07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-22
Updated: 2013-05-22
Packaged: 2017-12-12 14:31:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/812638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beetle/pseuds/beetle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spike’s thoughts while Xander’s unconscious in the hospital. 1,514 words. Angst! warning for most of the piece.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Staying Power

**Author's Note:**

> Notes/Spoilers: Un-beta'd. AU. Spoilers for “Dirty Girls” . Could be a companion piece to “Enough” if you’re thus inclined.

Stupid donut-boy. Bloody whelp.   
  
You kept calling her name, begging her to get you out of there, help you. Save you. It was all the soul could do to keep me from telling you to shut up, save your breath.  
  
It’s the damn soul made me carry you as carefully as possible, while chastising me for all the times I’ve been less than gentle with you. Making me see those big doe-eyes of yours, staring up into mine, all but begging me to see you -  
  
I mean, I don’t even know why I’m here, really. Red may be sleeping like the dead, but she’s got wards and things to wake her if you need anything; she’ll turn all mother lion to keep you as safe and comfortable as houses. And you - you’re out like a light; too high on pain and misery and probably morphine to be called asleep. I can smell you’re not gonna die. I could leave, you know? Find a bar to hole up in for the rest of the night. Slayer wouldn’t be brassed off if I did. Half expects it, I’d say, but -  
  
Barmy git.  
  
You smell like meds, now. Bitter and chemical-y. Usually you smell sweet, like some kind of cake; taste that way, too. Bet if I tasted you now, though, you’d taste like something with far too many consonants and only tentative FDA approval.  
  
And why the  _fuck_  didn’t you stay out of giant preacher-man’s way? Not like you could miss him: huge bloke radiating evil and insanity and gunning for your left eye, yeah? Baby Slayers - stronger and better fighters than you could ever hope to be - were laying dead on the floor and you still thought you could help? Bloody brilliant, mate!  
  
Cost you your eye to find out how useless you truly were. Are. How useless you  _are_. And lucky that’s all it cost you. Brainless pillock. You could’ve ended up like those poor chits. Cold and dead on the cold, red floor. Could’ve been -   
  
What d’you think it’d do to the Slayer and the others if you went and got y’self dead? Red flew apart when Glinda died, so I’ve heard. Barely got it back together. If you died, too, it’d be a race to see who’d annihilate us all, Red or the First! God, you’re a thoughtless moron, aren’t you? Haven’t any idea of what could’ve happened, do you? If I didn’t have this damn soul, I’d kick your stupid arse.  
  
If I didn’t... you have the sweetest scent I’ve ever smelled. Literally sweet, probably from all the sugary crap you cram down your gullet night and day. Smell just like dessert on a Sunday, you do. I’ll bet even your mouth tastes -  
  
Red’s snorting and frowning in her sleep; shifting around-like in the horrendously uncomfortable chair that’s a mate to my own. The demon wonders how safe it is to think about how you taste when your best friend,  _Uber-witch_ , slumbers so near.  
  
But, I can smell your blood so thick and rich in the air, and it’s wrong to want to taste it, to want to taste your perfect mouth, it’s -  
  
It’s William-the-bloody-soul rattling around in here, speaking of wrongnesses. Insipid, stupid soul. Oh, it’s  _wrong to want to taste the boy’s mouth_ , is it? As if I haven’t tasted other, less innocent places on you - and in you; haven’t tasted that ridiculously sweet blood already. As if that blood isn’t flowing through my own dead veins right now.  
  
William. The bloody hypocrite. I mean, it’s not the demon in me that wants you, boy. Isn’t the "Big Bad" that fucks you into a coma every chance it gets. The  _demon_  needs half a bottle of Macallan to pacify it so it won’t try to -  
  
Unfettered, the demon would drain you without pause and you’d be lucky if that was the end of it. This whole -  _thing_  that’s been happening between us was all the soul. All  _William_. Thinks he’s found peace and redemption in you, he does. And he’s gonna fuck every last drop of it out of you. Simpering poof. Dunno why I’m letting myself get dragged along for the ride. We both ought to know what damnation tastes like by now.  
  
William. The bloody fool. Still a sucker for brunets with deep, dark eyes.   
  
You and he deserve each other, Special Ed.   
  
Worthless tossers. Sentimental, sodding -  
  
Crap. You’re moaning in your sleep, hand scrabbling at the bandage covering the left half of your face; like a thought I’m leaning over you, pulling your hand away gently. I tuck it against my chest. Know you won’t feel a heart beat, pet, but you always felt it - feel it - when I purr. When I  _growl_. Always puts you right no matter what sort of Big Nasty is chasing through your dreams...  
  
Thank goodness. You’re calming down, you’ve stopped squirming and moaning. Look a little less miserable and ashen. Dunno know how it got here, but I’m pressing your hand to my lips and my eyes are stinging and blurry and - buggering hell.   
  
 _Please_...  
  
The bloody soul's rattling the bars of it’s cage, looking for away out, and it’s found it’s way, hasn’t it? Leaning us down until your face is our world, and your breath is soft on our lips... it speaks to you. Only. Ever. You.  
  
“You taste and smell like home to me, pet. Even with the meds and misery masking you, you’re still there underneath: sunshine and strength and purity and home. All there, pulsing under warm skin, waiting for me to - to - “  
  
 _Love you_ , is what the soul tries to say, at the same time, the demon wants to say  _taste you_. Bleeding  _Christ_  - I have to kiss you to just to shut ‘em both the hell up! And you know what? You  _do_  taste like all that poncy bugaboo the soul was yammering on about. All of that and more. You taste  _so good_  that I can’t remember why, what with blowing you and buggering you senseless, I never once kissed you. Not when your perfect sweetness is just aching to be tasted and cherished and loved and,   
  
 _Sired_.  
  
Yes. Exactly.  
  
“Spike.” A soft whisper in my right ear that sends a bolt of actual fear through me. I’m in gameface even before I pull away from you, whirling to face Red, who somehow got  _this_  close without me knowing.   
  
No-one’s there.  
  
Red’s still asleep. Still on the other side of your bed, eyes still closed. But that frown is deeper, determined. She’s closer to awake than she was a few minutes ago. And I may know bugger-all about Red’s flashy new super powers, but I don’t believe in coincidences. Not anymore. I  _don’t_  know if it was me or the soul thought that bit about - loving you, pet. But I know which was thinking about turning you. Then Red’s Wiccan-senses tingled or went off or something. Don’t really care. All that matters is I was stopped before - before.   
  
It’s time for me to go while we both still have souls to account to. Long past time. I’ll just get on my bike and out of town. Away from the First and the Slayer and the bloody Ginger Snap Brigade. Away from  _you_. I’m already half out the door, not a single backward glance from me, no way in hell. Slayer’ll protect you lot. Always does. Just like with the Mayor and Glory and -  
  
 _And Caleb.._  
  
I’ve stopped, foot out the door and foot in the room. I know if I close my eyes, I’ll see dead girls and a big, smiling preacher-man with his thumb inching towards your face while you stand helpless in his grasp.  
  
Sodding hell.  
  
There’s nothing for it, is there? How many more would die if I leave now? Would you be one of them?  
  
Bloody soul. William-the-bloody-soul. Fights as dirty as the demon ever did.  
  
The soul steers me back inside and sits me down in the medieval torture device that’s disguised as furniture. I can see you, Red and the door. She’s holding your right hand. I wanna take your left one, but I don’t. All I need is for Red to wake up and see me holding your hand like Florence-fucking-Nightingale. That’d make my unlife extra perfect.   
  
Come sunup, I’ll have to dodge every stray sunbeam the flimsy venetian blinds don’t keep out; my back’ll be taking the piss out of me. But someone has to look out for you.  _All_  of you. May as well be the artist formerly known as the Big Bad.  
  
Sleep, mate. When you wake up, I’ll be here. I’ll still be love’s bitch, but I’ll be here.  
  
Me and the useless, bloody, buggering  _soul_...


End file.
